The cost of private individual health plans on California's state-run market will increase about 4 percent for the second straight year, evidence the strategy of forcing insurers to compete is controlling costs, program officials said Monday.

As Medicare approaches its 50th anniversary next week, the federal program got some welcome financial news Wednesday: Its giant hospital trust fund will be solvent until 2030, and its long-term outlook has improved, according to a report from the program’s trustees.

Sallyann Johnson considers herself a pretty savvy health care consumer.

Some analysts who have looked at health insurers’ proposed premiums for next year predict major increases for policies sold on state and federal health exchanges.

Anthem Inc. is nearing a deal to buy Cigna Corp. for more than $48 billion in a transaction that, alongside another recent proposed tie-up of rivals, would reduce the number of companies atop the U.S. health-insurance industry to three from five.

Sallyann Johnson considers herself a pretty savvy health care consumer. When she fell and injured her hands and wrists, she didn’t head for an expensive emergency room, choosing an urgent care clinic near her Milwaukee home instead.